News for Speakers’ Corner, Christmas Eve.

“He sees you when you’re sleeping; he knows when you’re awake; he knows when you’ve been bad or good so be good for goodness sake!”
Rachel Crow, from a little ditty she wrote about Santa and God.

1. It appears the speakers have not totally killed our Christmas spirit. Two grasshoppers generously fed everyone with a hundred-weight of cherries. The cherries just kept coming and coming. And not just cherries: they also supplied us with mince pies. All that, plus Mr B’s cheesecake, kept us pretty full.

It was lovely.

2. When rain began pelting down Mr B lost his nerve and suggested we all leave. He’s a wimp, that Mr B. We just sheltered under the tree. Sure enough, a few minutes later the rain left us. We wiped the chairs and began again.

Later, the rained returned, but this time there was lightning too. It scared the bejesus out of Mr B who saw it directly. Everyone else had their back turned to it. Mr B wanted to wimp out again but we wouldn’t let him. Sure enough, the rain and lightning soon stopped. We again wiped the chairs and began yet again.

Perhaps Mr B was thinking of this famous photo, taken when the two brothers’ hair was “playing up”. Soon after the photograph was taken they were hit by lightning. Thanks to reader William George, you can click here to learn how the two lads fared.

3. Well, Helmut keeps surprising us! When he stood upon the Ladder of Knowledge he spoke about lost civilisations and in particular, the Mayans. His knowledge is extensive. It was as though he specialised in the subject. Yet he has never spoken about them before!

The man is amazing.

Helmut has, without doubt, an encyclopedic knowledge of a variety of subjects. He continues to astonish. This scribe suspects we have only just scratched the surface.

Mind you, the Mayans have a lot to answer for, scaring us with their calendar.

4. Mr Bhas his grasshoppers, and he has his garden gnomes. Mr B has outed a few garden gnomes in his time.

That habit prompted two of his grasshoppers to present him with a Christmas gift today. He is so pleased with it, and so proud, that he has just sent this scribe a photo of it. It’s sitting proudly on his mantelpiece. He again warmly thanks grasshoppers.

One of Mr B’s pet flies obligingly provides scale.

5. Someone sent in this lookalike of Ben the Whisperer. Thanks for that!

Keep them coming, folks!

6. Ray, our evangelist Christian, was on hand to answer the following question (thanks to Jon Jermey for providing it): If three wise men delivered gold, frankincense and myrrh to Jesus, what did the family do with all that wealth?

Unfortunately, this inspired further questions like, “Did Jesus gamble much of the money away, and get into debt, and that’s why he was upset with the moneylenders?”

Thankfully, Ray dealt with these stupid questions and set us all straight. Thanks, Ray.

Ray likes to email this scribe the occasional question. For example: “If atheists don’t believe in God, what are they celebrating at Christmas?” He included this meme with his question.

It was nice to hear from you today, Ray.

7.In 1914 a submarine sunk. It was found recently. The media have expressed sentiments like: “At last the descendants of those killed in that submarine can have closure,” and “this will bring peace of mind to the descendents.”

Mr B figures that if anyone had known one of the submariners and was still alive today, they would be at least 110 years old and too gaga to still be grieving. The rest of us, including the descendents, have never met the submariners and wouldn’t give a rat’s arse. Therefore, “closure” and “peace of mind” are not in any way applicable to the situation. The media added that fake emotional element to make the item more newsworthy. Typical.

Finding the submarine meant nothing to anyone except the navy, who would have been testing their ‘searching’ technology. Thanks to Peter the Younger for pointing that out.

8. Did Mr B reveal too much about himself today? Yes, he might have.

9. Greg, a regular grasshopper, told us how he was scammed twice in the same week. He signed up to a Telstra deal but didn’t read the fine print on page 109, so he received only 16mbs instead of the 40 he thought he was paying for.

And, his vet scammed him. Greg’s dog had a tick, and the vet charged him more than $100 for the medicine. When Greg got home he did a little research and found that the medicine was just Aspirin. He rang the vet, who told him that vets can charge what they like.

Holy moly.

10. The ‘Something Nice’ segment, to charm some and irritate others.

11. Other subjects discussed:– In past weeks, Mr B has heavily criticised arguments put forth by smug atheists. Today he planned to pull apart another of their weak arguments, but was halted. (Not by divine intervention, obviously.)

– Mr B explained how status evolved, and added a homily at the end for good measure. From there, Mark the Grinner outlined the role testosterone plays in relationships. (It’s more than you think.) Most interesting.

– We discussed a glaring deficiency in the football game called ‘soccer’. That deficiency makes the game a farce, and until it’s fixed the game will always be a farce.

– Mr B expressed genuine concern for all the priests (the vast majority) who have done nothing wrong, yet have to live their lives and perform their job hearing about the sex scandals perpetrated by others in the Church they love. Not only are those innocent priests tarred with the same brush, it must hurt them considerably to have their Church betrayed so heavily.

– The difference between a belief and a theory. (That seemingly benign topic inspired fervent disagreement!)